


If Man Were the Sky and Could See the Earth Clearly

by yuletide_archivist



Category: Swordspoint Series - Ellen Kushner
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-12-25
Updated: 2007-12-25
Packaged: 2018-01-25 03:10:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,199
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1628474
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yuletide_archivist/pseuds/yuletide_archivist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>'There is no one like you, they never told me there was anyone like you, I had no idea, it amazes me, Richard - Richard - if I had known - if I -'</p>
            </blockquote>





	If Man Were the Sky and Could See the Earth Clearly

**Author's Note:**

> Written for bantha fodder

 

 

* * *

* * *

"Harry and I, doing experiments. Taking notes... We're going to do a book. It will influence generations to come." ~Alec, _Swordspoint_

'Richard St Vier had been his father's first and most famous lover.' ~ Theron, _The Fall of the Kings_

* * *

* * *

Alec idly caressed the guilt spines of the books lining the shelf, tapping thoughtfully on the last one in the row before sliding it out and flipping the leather-tooled cover open to the first page. He smiled, dryly amused, upon reading the first few lines and flipped the pages one by one, skimming the words as they passed. Outside, the rain that had fallen all afternoon stopped as he read. The gray storm clouds parted and the last light of the setting sun burnished the rich, cream pages of the book a dull copper. He looked up when the door swung open and a tall, elegant woman came in.

He closed the book. "Hello, grandmamma," he said, straightening from his slouch against the window.

"Ah, David," the duchess smiled in greeting. Walking over to him, she touched her fingers to his chin and kissed him on the mouth. "So good of you to come on time. Please, sit down. And I see you're already enjoying my newest purchase."

As he took the cushion beside her, Alec glanced down at the book he still held in one hand and felt almost surprised. "Oh, yes," he said and, without glancing at the pages, quoted a few passages verbatim. Then he smiled depreciatively. "It has the Chair of Rhetoric quite excited."

The duchess waved a hand languidly through the air. "Oh, is that so? I wouldn't know. Felman recommended it."

Alec raised an eyebrow mockingly. "I suppose the recommendation was on the strength of it matching colors with your new drapes?"

The duchess' own finely plucked eyebrows rose in a show of surprise. "Oh, of course. It certainly wouldn't do to be otherwise."

Dryly, Alec thought how perfectly coincidental that the newest row of books on the shelf, including the one in his hand, were all leather and gilt copies of his own rather battered hand-me-down books hidden at his University lodging. In fact, the title in his hand was one Harry had just managed to salvage from their local rubbish seller four days ago. It was obvious that the duchess was paying someone to report to her on her grandson's doings and was not averse to letting him know it.

Alec shrugged. "Well, no matter. It's an uninteresting work of drivel." Let her pay to find out his what he ate for breakfast, it made no difference. And he tossed the book aside onto the table. 

They smiled coolly at each other in perfect understanding.

A polite knock broke their brief impasse, and both looked up as a young woman stepped into the parlor. She ducked her head shyly, auburn curls falling around her ears, and laid the laden tray she had been carrying on the low table beside them.

Alec eyed the new maid with interest. He wondered if this one's name was also Katherine or Kathy or Kate.

The duchess smiled warmly at the pretty young woman, and lifted a steaming cup from the tray. "Thank you, my dear. Chocolate, David?" she said to Alec. "It's very fashionable these days."

He took the proffered cup and sipped at the rich, bitter beverage, feeling distinctly amused. His grandmamma's predilections weren't many, but in this case, extremely predictable.

"Thank you, Kathy," he said to the young woman with perfect charm.

If possible, the young woman blushed even harder. "It's Caitlin, milord," she whispered.

Alec smiled with teeth. "Oh, of course," he said to the maid. "I must have confused you with someone else."

"That'll be all, Caitlin," the duchess said sharply.

The young woman stammered an assent and quickly backed out of the parlor. The door closed quietly behind her.

"She's lovely," Alec said with apparent offhandedness. "A butcher's daughter, perhaps? Or is it a streetwalker this time." He tapped the porcelain side of his cup thoughtfully. "I never can tell with your maids."

The duchess raised an eyebrow in apparent indifference. "Oh? I had no idea you were so interested." She sipped delicately at her chocolate. "And how is your...special...friend? The cowherd, was it?"

"He's not -" He stopped himself and carefully unclenched his fingers from around the cup. He should know better than to be goaded like this. He made himself ignore the insinuation. "Harry is a brilliant scholar - no matter what his birth. And anyway," he continued forcefully, "it was sheep, not cows."

The duchess waved her hand dismissively. She set aside her cup. "As you say. Here." She reached into the small coffer sitting beside her and withdrew a small embroidered bag. It clinked gently when she dropped it on the table between them. "I suppose this is what you came for, your allowance for the month."

Unable to help it, Alec flushed. Carefully, he drained his chocolate before setting his empty cup down beside hers on the tray.

She never failed to remind him under whose beneficence he was living on: it would have been ludicrously simple for her to arrange something with her lawyers so that Alec needn't come begging at her house every month for his living stipend. But then again, such benevolence was not in the nature of Diane the Duchess of Tremontaine. Alec may try to graze her with what little slights he could - such as coming late to their monthly meetings, or making insinuations of her maids - but in the end both he and she knew who kept the upper hand. The truth was, he needed her.

He took the purse. "Thank you, grandmamma." He allowed his mouth to curl only a little in derision, most of it aimed at himself. 

She had given him his stipend inordinately fast tonight. Usually it took them at least an hour of dancing around with pointed words and insinuations before she even deigned to open the coffer. Alec knew then that she had been preoccupied with someone else before he came - one of her fancy boys, no doubt, who she'd probably made wait in whatever state of undress she'd left him. Whatever else Alec may say of her, she had always put him first.

"I'll take my leave now," he drawled, "let you return to your evening amusement."

But as he moved to stand, she caught him by the hand, her fingers sliding long and cool along his palm. "Do make sure to take those little iced cakes with you," she murmured with a smile, "I had Cook make it especially."

For a moment, he hesitated. But he couldn't ignore the pressure on his hand or her implacable, waiting gaze.

Face carefully impassive, he leaned over to kiss her on the cheek. She turned her face just as his lips grazed her skin, so that his kiss landed instead on the corner of her mouth. She was warm, and tasted of wine and chocolate.

"The days are growing cold," the duchess murmured as he drew back. "Try not to spend all your allowance on books, my dear, and get yourself a new robe."

Alec didn't trust himself to speak and only nodded shortly. When she let go of his hand, he quickly tucked it back into the voluminous sleeves of his student robes, and without saying anything else, he left her.

He was stopped only once, at the front door, when one of the serving maids handed him the carefully wrapped package of little cakes.

The stars were already visible by the time Alec got back from the Hill and strode through the dark twisting maze of the University living quarters. The room he shared with Harry was at the top of what had once been a guard tower during the days of the monarchy. From the base of the tower, Alec could see that Harry had already blown out the lantern - no light shone from the window at the top. It was obvious that Harry had begun without him.

Alec ducked under the low-hanging lintel and quickly mounted the four flights of stairs leading to the garret.

Harry didn't turn around when the door opened, remaining before his place in front of the casement. The inside of the little attic was as drafty as the outside, the night air blowing in through the wide-open window. "You're early," he said absently, eyes fixed on the firmament. His quill scratched incessantly on a scrap of parchment beside him, illuminated only by moonlight.

Alec shut the door softly behind him and walked over to where Harry sat. He peeked over Harry's shoulders and saw it already crowded with Harry's black chicken scratches and the occasional, perfectly curved parabola.

Both Harry and the stones of the towers smelled of the clean, crisp air after a storm.

"The rain stopped, just like you predicted," Alec commented.

"Of course. Had to do it often enough when herding sheep for my da. Hand me the sextant, will ya?" Laying the package of cakes on the floor, Alec drew his student's robe tight around his chest and stepped directly in front of the cold draft coming though the window as he picked up the sextant. Harry murmured his thanks as he took the instrument from him.

"So. What did your grandmam say?"

Alec shrugged carelessly, not looking at Harry. "Same as before. Nothing I couldn't handle."

He heard the clatter of the sextant on the tabletop, felt the sudden pressure of Harry's eyes on him. "You...didn't ask her." The other man's voice was flat and accusing.

Alec closed his eyes, felt the implacable pressure of her fingers on his hand, tasted wine and chocolate. "I -" He swallowed, clenched his hands together inside his sleeves. "No. I didn't." He opened his eyes to see Harry looking at him, face still and hard like a stranger. "Harry -"

"You promised," Harry said quietly. "I've never asked for anything else from you. Have I?"

"That's true, but -" He leaned over, grabbed Harry's hands, pulled him close. "Harry -" his voice was low and almost pleading, "We don't need her. We have the proof - the mathematics - they're undeniable. Don't you -" His fingers clenched around Harry's. "Don't you believe in our work?"

Harry shook Alec impatiently off him and stood up. "And having her support would make the evidence even more undeniable," he snapped, turning away. Then he sighed, passed a hand over his face. He turned back to Alec. "I'm sorry." Alec held still as Harry touched the lock of hair that had fallen over Alec's eyes, smoothed it back behind his ear. But Harry didn't take his hand away after; instead, the calloused tips of his fingers remained resting lightly against Alec's temple.

"But you understand, don't you?" he said quietly, staring into Alec's eyes, "That if we can do this - make them _believe_ \- we'll change the way the world looks."

Alec swallowed against a mouth as dry as weeks' old bread. Harry's thumb was now almost caressing his temple. Heat and confused thoughts rushed through him. He wanted to ask what Harry was doing - the other man had never touched him like this before. They were friends, nothing more. Harry had not wanted more.

"Harry..." A tight, cold knot was growing in his chest, despite the flush of arousal that was rushing past his belly. But he couldn't seem to get himself to push the other man away.

"What do you want, Alec?" Harry murmured. His breath was warm against Alec's mouth.

"Harry..." His voice sounded unlike himself - cold and strange. "You don't fuck boys."

Harry stepped away from him so quickly, Alec stumbled forward a step, hip bumping into the table and knocking parchments onto the floor. He caught himself on the edge of the table, his breathing sounding inordinately loud in his ears.

Somewhere, as if from a great distance, he heard Harry whisper, "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have done that."

Alec felt his mouth twist in the beginning of a sneer; it felt ugly even from the inside. The weight of the Tremontaine ring on the chain around his neck was suddenly both yoke and bitter, mocking reminder.

So. Even here, where he'd thought he'd been safe.

"Da and ma died many years ago. My sister was the one who raised me."

Alec was silent. The other man seldom spoke of where he came from or what his family was like. In fact, this was only the second time Harry had mentioned his sister. He wondered what the other man would say. How he would plead.

"I write to her whenever I can. She can't read well and writes not at all, but our village priest scribes for her. Her eyesight is failing, but she still sends me what money she can from her weaving. She tells me everything is fine and that she's waiting for me to come back when I'm a Doctor." Harry's voice was low and hoarse. "Alec, I can't fail."

Alec stared at the play of tendons beneath his skin, feeling the bones grind together as he gripped his hands together on the tabletop. He could feel the heavy, oppressive air of Harry's expectancy, and sweat gathered at the nape of his neck, though the cold, night air still blew through the open window. He felt sick and overheated.

"...Alec?"

"I'll use them." He couldn't look at Harry, afraid of what his face might reveal. "My name, my money, my relations." He slid the chain off his neck and unchained the ring. He slid the ring onto his forefinger. The ruby spanned two knuckles, flanked by diamonds, set in white gold. In the darkness, it seemed to Alec that the ducal stone gleamed mockingly. "In a fortnight. When we go with Stone and Griffin to defend our findings."

He heard Harry approach him from behind, felt Harry's hand on his face. "Thank you," Harry whispered.

Alec's eyes slid shut, unable to bear it, on the mingled breath of relief and gratitude in Harry's voice. Harry's hands were large and gentle, and Alec felt the calloused fingertips rest against his temple.

In his mind, the ugliness that had taken possession of his thoughts laughed, low and amused.

He kept his eyes closed when Harry leaned in and kissed him chastely on the brow.

* * *

_But in the end, it was all for nothing._

* * *

She looked up from her book when he slammed open the library door. Servants trailed behind him, futilely trying to block him; she waved them off.

"My dear, what's the matter?"

Then she took one careful look at his face, and immediately laid the book aside on a nearby table. "You're not satisfied with the outcome," she stated. It was not a question. 

Alec threw the crumpled paper in his hand at her face. She caught it, raised an eyebrow. "This - this _letter_ of retraction on our theory -" His lips was drawn taught and bloodless against his teeth. "It has _my_ name on it."

The duchess shook her head, smoothed out and laid the document on the table beside her. "Dear boy," she sighed, "did you truly want to be stripped of your robes as well?"

"You promised -" He spoke in shallow breaths, like a man on a mountaintop taking in impossibly thin air. "When I accepted your offer, that you would _help_ us. Not - not -"

"David," the duchess chided, looking maternal and compassionate. "The politics were a little...complicated, even before you came to me. Do you know how many very important people you and your friends offended? No? Well, if it makes any difference, you should know I stopped them from throwing your friends in prison."

"What you did instead," Alec rasped, "was worse."

The stark, disbelieving silence. The betrayed look in Harry's eyes.

"They didn't listen, they didn't even let us defend. They just -" He heard his voice break; he stopped. He clenched his teeth against the scream that threatened from his throat.

"They showed us that paper," he finally continued, his voice fragile and tight, "to Stone and Griffin...and-and Harry. And then they stripped the robes off everyone. Everyone, but me."

Harry wouldn't believe him, had pushed him aside. Had locked him out.

"I need you need to _fix_ this."

The duchess shook her head slowly. "I'm sorry, my dear," she said, "But I can't do that." She lifted an elegant, white hand and rested it gently on the heavily carved armrest. "And the only reason you were not stripped of your robe was because the chancellors realized you're mine."

He felt strangely numb.

"I. Am not _yours_."

The duchess arched a delicate, silver-fair brow. "If I must remind you, grandson, you _are_ living on my beneficence." And lightly, she touched a fingertip to the gem that hung on a chain between her breasts. The ducal ruby glinted darkly against her pale skin.

That ruby's twin sat on the ring on Alec's forefinger. For a moment, trembling, he stared at her. Then he spoke:

"Is that it?"

His voice was very low and strangely calm.

The duchess frowned slightly at this sudden change. "What is?"

He regarded the woman before him with straight, clear eyes. "All this, just an elaborate ploy to have me crawling to you, desperate and compliant. A novel way of irritating mother at the family dinner."

"What fancies." The duchess' tone was dry and exceedingly amused; she leaned into her chair. "I hardly have the time, dear boy."

"Or you've simply decided it's no fun," Alec continued bitingly, "our current hands-off arrangement, and now want to rein me in with your money and your...affluence."

She sighed, looked convincingly put-upon. "Please stop. David, you're family, and you have such promise. Is it so bad," she smiled gently at him, "for me to want what's best for you?"

But he didn't answer her smile. Instead, he slid the ducal ring off his finger and cradled it, for a moment, in his hand. The orange light from the fireplace glinted off the ruby, briefly turning the red stone to liquid flame. Then, almost negligently, he tilted his palm and let the ring fall to the ground.

The ring rolled away from him, rattling to a stop on the hard, marble floor before the duchess' slippered feet.

The duchess had gripped the armrests, was half-risen in her seat. "David, what -"

"Thank you, Grandmamma," he told her, perfectly courteous. "But I'm not coming back. Feel free to bestow the duchy on my sister - I'm sure mother would appreciate it." And saying so, he bowed and turned sharply on his heels.

He had already reached the doorway, had one hand on the latch, before her voice sounded across the room.

"You're being a fool, David Campion."

He paused, then briefly looked back to see her standing tall and erect before the great roaring fire in the fireplace. The firelight glinted off the ring that still lay, untouched from where it'd rolled, at her feet. He couldn't see her face in the flickering shadows, but the cold surety of her tone was as familiar as to him as a mother's discontent.

"Maybe. But at least I'm no longer a whore."

And he left, not waiting to hear what she'd say to that.

It didn't take him long to return to the student's quarters. Alec took the stairs up the garret, two at a time, unheeding of the dangerous creaking beneath his feet as he ran upstairs to find Harry. The door was unlocked; his breath caught. He flung the door wide open, gladly anticipating the sight of Harry's face, willing to bear whatever acrimony - so long as Harry would finally see him. He would listen, Alec would _make_ him listen - and together they would find a way, some way -

"Harry -"

He caught himself, stumbling to a stop before the wide-open window. Ash drifted from the still-smoldering remnants of manuscript in the grate.

The tiny room was empty.

* * *

_Two days after the Board of Governors stripped all but one of the four defendants of their scholar's robes, the city watch found Harry in the river._

* * *

The corpse was bloated and three-days old by the time they'd finally had the funeral. Only the cold onslaught of autumn kept the smell bearable. In the tiny, upstairs garret, the grate remained unlit. Instead, three mourners shivered beneath their thin, patched cloaks, keeping watch around the shrouded body ringed in candlelight. They barely managed to fit into the room.

Beside the bed, a girl moaned, clutching her fist to her mouth. "Oh, Harry, my love, oh," she kept crying, over and over again. Alec wanted to hit her.

"They did this to him. They killed him." That was Stone, sounding grim and righteously outraged.

Griffin growled in agreement. "Harry would have given them a new order to the world. And instead, they drove him to this."

"He -" Stone's voice broke, before he continued slowly, "Harry did not deserve to die like this. This was murder."

"He was a fool."

All turned to stare at Alec. Alec did not look at them, only continued to watch the tiny garret window above, where pigeons rustled and pecked at the ledge. The birds were seeking the breadcrumbs that Harry always laid out for them. They would look in vain.

Alec's voice, when he spoke again, was flat and vicious. "Faithless and a fool. He deserved his end."

And when Harry's lover screeched in bereaved rage and flew at him, murder in her eyes, he didn't stop her. Griffin swore. Hands quickly pulled her away, the strength of two men needed to overcome Harry's tiny lover in her fit of madness. Only Stone and Griffin's interventions kept Alec from receiving anything more than a few superficial scratches. Griffin held the girl back firmly in his arms. Behind him, Stone stood ready to lend a hand. But looking into their hard-eyed faces, Alec knew that the two men had not stopped her for his sake. They did not want Harry's common-born lover to be guilty of mauling a nobleman - they well knew that those convicted were not sentenced lightly.

Griffin kept one arm securely around the girl's waist. He didn't let her go, even though she now slumped against his chest weeping soundlessly. "You're a cold, hard-hearted bastard," he growled. "This was all a game to you, wasn't it, Campion? Something to pass the boredom, before you go back to your comfortable little life on the Hill." He spat on the floor. "Nothing to lose."

Alec ignored the man, indifferent to the hostility and scorn. His cheek smarted. When he raised a hand to his face, his fingers came away smeared with blood. He gazed at it, feeling strangely detached from it all.

"You're absolutely right, Griffin," he finally responded, carelessly. "None of this meant anything." Then, looking at each of the drawn faces before him, he gave them all a smile full of airy indifference. "And you're all fools if you think it did."

Stone told him quietly, "You'd better go."

Alec shrugged. "Sure." He glanced over at the bloated corpse on the bed and paused, tilted his head consideringly. "Probably should have left _that_ in the river. At least then the fish would have gotten something out of it."

"Get. Out." Griffin enunciated each word, looming dangerously. In his arms, the girl shuddered. Stone stared coldly from the shadows.

Alec laughed, high and clear, and walked out the attic room, closing the door softly behind him.

* * *

* * *

Richard St Vier wasn't given to charity - and in the normal course of events wouldn't even have paid attention to the stranger on the Bridge as he returned from one of his assignments on the Hill - but something about the bowed head seemed both pitiful and defiant. The incongruity caught him, stopped his feet before the huddled stranger.

"You," Richard said curtly, "shouldn't be here." 

The bundled form straightened from its crouch, and Richard realized with mild surprise that the stranger loomed a good head above him.

"Have you come to take me too then?"

The voice was young and high, and Richard knew finally that it was only a boy. A boy who spoke with the crisp consonants and drawn out vowels of the nobility. The words he'd spoken were strange, and from anyone else Richard would have dismissed them as a sad attempt to get into his bed and his purse.

But under the moonlight, Richard saw that, for all the boy's height, the face was young, painfully young, and strangely innocent.

"That's alright," the boy continued, "I've been waiting for you." Then his mouth curved in a strange smile that was breathless and brilliant at once.

And for some reason, though he had no idea what the boy meant, Richard found himself saying, "Come with me."

He turned and walked into Riverside.

And strangely enough, the boy followed.

* * *

"There is no one like you, they never told me there was anyone like you, I had no idea, it amazes me, Richard - Richard - if I had known - if I -" ~Alec, _Swordspoint_

* * *

Title from Nicole Oresme, _Le Livre du ciel et du monde_ (1377). 

 


End file.
